Writing
by Lupinista
Summary: It's written all over his face... and all over her paper. Set somewhere in the midst of 11.20 and 11.27. Eclare all the way.


**A/N: This is a short little oneshot I wrote over a year ago, shortly after Degrassi's prom when Adam got shot. I was going through old files on my computer and realized I'd never posted it, so I decided to just upload it in memory of old Degrassi - in my opinion, before it got impersonal and dull.**

**Disclaimer: I own neither Degrassi nor Eclare, just my love for their love.**

**x**

"Has everyone turned in their exam score cards?"

The raucous chatter didn't let up in the slightest – for some, it merely intensified, and Miss Dawes merely smiled and returned her attention to the stack of turned-in exams. She picked up the papers in a bundle, gently leveling the uneven edges against the tabletop, and carried the stack to her desk. There were a mere three minutes until the end of the school year, and her advanced English class seemed ready as ever to be free of Degrassi's confining walls. Summer was slowly overtaking Toronto. Her eyes found one student removing his leather jacket, fanning himself with a notebook. Just whom she'd been looking for.

"Eli?" she spoke, attempting to get his attention. He didn't turn, so she tried again, her voice louder and slightly more urgent. "Mr. Goldsworthy?"

Eli's head snapped up, Miss Dawes's murmur just enough to break his concentration from his best friend, Adam Torres.

"May I hold you after the last bell?" she asked him. The room was still alive with boisterous activity, but Eli caught most of the sentence by lip reading.

"Sure," he said, nodding in consent though unable to stop an eyebrow from quirking in confusion. But Miss Dawes was looking down, and he completely missed the twinkle in her eye.

The bell rang a short minute later, and twenty students jumped to their feet and raced from the room. One in particular caught Eli's attention as she bustled past, purposefully not meeting his gaze. Her blue eyes flicked this way and that, everywhere but Eli himself, shining in the light coming through the window. And then she was gone in a cloud of teenage body odor and exam study guides.

"See ya," Adam muttered, nodding to Eli before heading out himself, at a much slower pace.

Eli stood, slung his backpack over his left shoulder, and approached Miss Dawes's desk. She finished the sentence she'd been reading and looked up to Eli, her eyes kind and motherly.

"I hope you continue to explore your love of writing, even with some of the hiccups you dealt with this year," she said after a moment, clasping her hands together on the top of her desk.

"I plan on it," Eli replied. "Thank you."

He took a step backwards, as if to leave, but Miss Dawes flinched. "That's not all," she said hastily. She bent over the arm of her desk chair to her left, rummaging in a tote bag and pulling out a thin, stapled stack of paper.

"This probably is none of my business," Miss Dawes murmured, and it took Eli a moment to realize she was speaking to him. "But this is something I think you'd be interested in reading."

_The hardest part of loving someone is when they upset you, or you upset them, and you go through a period, however lengthy, of either ruthless conflict or complete and utter silence. I have yet to decide which scenario is worse, but the absence of your loved one is enough to tear apart the remaining bits of sanity left in your heart._

Eli glanced up at the author and had to do a triple-take, then squint, and still did not quite understand… Why had Miss Dawes handed him Clare's final writing assignment?

"Just… keep reading," Miss Dawes urged him, a small smile appearing on her kindly face.

"With all due respect," Eli replied, beginning to hand the papers back, "I don't think this is my business."

"It's about you, don't you see? All about you."

Eli turned away and started for the door. "She has someone else."

"Clearly, her thoughts aren't always on him, then, are they?"

Eli paused, his hand on the door handle, before turning to face Miss Dawes. Her eyes were troubled. "What are you trying to do?" he asked her.

"Look," she said slowly, adjusting her glasses, "it's not in my place to meddle. But Mr. Goldsworthy – Eli – you need closure. You need to cope. I see you watching her with puppy dog eyes every day, though I get the impression you feel your time with Miss Edwards is done and gone." She stopped momentarily, and for once Eli didn't see his middle-aged English teacher; he felt he was looking at a highly aged woman, perhaps one hundred years old. His eyes zeroed in on her crows feet and her eyes, which looked far away.

"You two had a connection, a balance, not only in writing but with each other. You've both faced your trials, you've both grown. I'm willing to bet you yourself have overcome much more this year than ever before in your life."

The room was dead silent, save for the hum of Miss Dawes's computer.

"Eli, you and Clare have a _beautiful _story. It's been pushed to the back of the shelf with the dusty manuscripts and unsharpened pencils. But in the near future you'll pull it back out, give it a go again. I know one thing for sure – it isn't finished."


End file.
